The Tragedy of Humanism – Sayyid Naquib al-Attas

Sayyid Muhammad al-Naquib bin Ali al-Attas (born September 5, 1931) is a prominent contemporary Muslim philosopher and thinker from Malaysia. He is the author of twenty-seven authoritative works on various aspects of Islamic thought and civilization, particularly on Sufism, cosmology, metaphysics, philosophy and Malay language and literature. (Source)

The Tragedy of Humanism

By Sayyid Naquib al-Attas

“Humanistic philosophy and the gradual process of secularization together with the rise of secular philosophy and science, made tragedy, instead of religion, the exaltation of man. Fear must be purged not by faith in God, but by the banishment of God from the realm of creation; self pity must be purged not by remembrance of God, but by pride in humanity and defiant acceptance of the human predicament. The causal factor in tragedy is no longer the old Greek Fate nor the God of religion, but social and individual conflicts, biological heredity, the psychology of the unconscious, defeat by frustration, man confronted by the mystery of the universe, the eternal quest of man, and the absurdity of life. Freedom of the will becomes a firm belief because it helps in the perpetual struggle against obstacles that prevent from reaching the goal. But the goal is evershifting. Can Sisyphus ever be happy in having eternally to push the stone up the hill where at the top it is destined to roll down again?”

But hasn’t the fate-as-such of the Greeks been replaced with a more refined, articulated understanding of what constitutes fate? Is the point of existence happiness? Or is that just an illusion that keeps popular religion alive while at the same time creating massive amounts of unhappiness among those who are repressed the strictures of literalism?

Sidi Luqman, yes it is more refined and articulated, or just alternatively articulated as it states, fate related to ‘conflicts, biological heredity….’. The point of existence can be defined as happiness if happiness is appropriately defined (as Sidi Khuram indicates). If happiness is something that indicates one’s closeness to God then the corresponding aim of life, to get pious, is the goal of religion. If the religion ‘works’ then this goal is not just an empty promise, gimmick/slogan, and the proof of it working is through the people it produces (not just in the past but in the modern day). If the majority followers of one religion are not praying or are ‘getting worse’ in their piety, then the causes of this must be dissected, are they being prevented from following their religion, are they doing it properly? That question, and similar ones must be answered prior to asking ‘does their religion work’. Of course we are leaving out theological debates and proofs of that form.

Indeed if there is repression through too much literalism or liberalism or whatever, then indeed there will be unhappiness and people may not reach their goals through such forms of faith. It is important to check out the reasons for people taking such routes, and to deconstruct the context.

2-3. It depends on how you define happiness. Attas has a great discussion on the different types of happiness and explains the Islamic conception as sa’adah. For example, denying a child candy may cause them to be temporarily unhappy versus the pain of getting a cavity which causes another type of unhappiness. Consumer culture seems to provide people with temporary pleasure but also generates other forms of unhappiness in the form of stress derived from work, relationships, debt, etc. I’ll try and post Attas’ discussion on happiness next week inshallah.